Modern Quilts With A Twist

Main menu

Category Archives: Blog

Post navigation

The Gypsy Wife quilt is quilted, and bound, and ready to go to its “forever home”, as our daughter calls it when one of the animals she fosters is adopted.

I recently read a post listing pictures we supposedly should take of every quilt, and thought “not”. I think Rita, at Red Pepper Quilts, does one of the best jobs anywhere on her photos and posts about her quilts. She includes enough pictures for me to get a good idea of the quilt. Even better, she lists “statistics” about each quilt at the end of the post. So here’s my attempt:

First, a picture showing the back and giving a closer view of the binding:

Then, a picture of my favorite block. OK, that wasn’t Rita’s idea, but I like it 🙂

A picture showing the quilting:

Gypsy Wife Quilt

Pattern: Gypsy Wife by Jen Kingwell, with several modifications by me

Fabric: Just A Speck collection by Jen Kingwell,

Moda Grunge in various colors

And a few others

Finished Size: 61” x 66”

OK, did any of those pictures or details add to your experience of the quilt?

My blog just entered its 5th year, and I’m celebrating by linking to some blogs written by my blog-world friends.

First, two of my blog friends have nominated my blog for another Liebster Award. This award was started by a blog called The Global Aussie as a way for people to find new blogs. I have no idea how many times it’s gone around the world, but the Global Aussie keeps issuing new “rules” each year to keep it going.

I was nominated by both my friend Graciela, at Chela’s Colchas y Mas, and by another friend, Tierney, at Tierney Creates. Both of them post on a variety of subjects, quilting and otherwise. I enjoy them and would nominate them back if I could, but of course that would not be passing along the award. So, I recommend checking out their blogs at the links above. As an incentive, here’s a favorite picture recently posted by Tierney on her blog. Isn’t it fantastic?

I’ll answer a few of this year’s suggested questions in a minute, for those of you who may be curious about me. But first, here are some blogs I enjoy and can recommend to you. They are, therefore, my nominations for the Liebster Award. I’m trying to get this out of one circle of friends who all read each others’ blogs so you can see something new.

I enjoy Stephanie’s posts at My Imperfect Life. She has a pointy sense of humor, and we have Texas in common, even though hers is an Aggie household (eek!). Oh yes, and she blogs about quilts, too.

Here is one of Stephanie’s quilts. Photo courtesy of Stephanie at My Imperfect Life

I also enjoy Crafting in the 21st Century, written by a couple who, like my husband and me, are a sewist and a woodworker. I knew I had to follow them when they encased a bunch of fire ants in resin to make a blank for turning a pen. They’re obviously as crazy as we are. In a good way 🙂

OK, here are my responses to a few of this year’s Liebster Award questions:

Out of all the countries you have visited, which one did you like the most? Canada. The Canadians are mostly very sane, and they have some beautiful scenery.

What is the most extreme thing you have ever done? Woo! People who know me would say this is quite a contest. But I think probably the winner would be working as a health care provider in a male maximum security prison.

What/Who inspires you to travel this world? The opportunity to learn something new every day!

And that’s it! Check out the blogs who nominated me, and the blogs I’ve nominated. Spread the love!

But the idea stayed with me, and earlier this year, when I wanted to make a quilt with social significance, I decided on a QR code.

Since my “day job” involves a lot of treating conditions that condoms might have prevented, I wanted to make a quilt to promote condom use. It’s what we like to call “safer sex”. Now don’t get all huffy on me; sex is a fact of life.

When I went looking for a condom-related QR code, I found this one developed by Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest and the Hawaiian Islands.

The folks at Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest and Hawaiian Islands were gracious enough to allow me to use their QR code

Back in 2012 they put this QR code on all their condoms in a campaign called “Where Did You Wear It?”. Those who scan the code are taken to a website where they can put a pin in a map to show their geographic location–where they wore the condom!

The site also gives some important facts about condom use. The point of their campaign, and my point in making this quilt for show, is to normalize, encourage, and promote the use of condoms when needed.

It turns out QR codes are robust little devils, so I was able to re-color it and develop a lively quilt design with the use of my trusty Electric Quilt program:

Quilt Design from the “Where Did You Wear It?” QR code

Making this was quite a challenge! At each step I kept scanning it to be sure it took me to the “Where Did You Wear It?” site. (You can download any of several QR code scanners to your smart phone or iPad. I used QMark.)

The QR Code quilt, ready for its first show. It will the in the Asheville Quilt Show soon!

When I discussed the project with my wonderful son-in-law, he helped me turn my blog address into a QR code, too! That’s this blog address you see in the TINY QR code making up one block toward the bottom right of the quilt. Scanning it brings you to this post.

Please help me to encourage condom use when appropriate by sharing this post.

The WordPress people send me two statistical reports a year regarding my blog, and of course I can look at statistics on my administrative page at any time. I don’t stress it or check very often, so I was quite surprised when the recent report from WordPress said people from 61 different countries viewed my blog in 2015!

This picture of Iceland is from NordicFoodFestival.org

Most of the countries were predictable: the U.S., Canada, U.K., Australia, and New Zealand. But there were views from every continent except Antarctica! The place I got the biggest kick out of was Iceland 🙂

This improvised log cabin block, which was made into a pillow, appears to have been the most viewed picture on the site.

improvised log cabin block

Jo Glover

And my most popular post was about Jo Glover, who first developed Big Stitch quilting but doesn’t always get enough credit now that everybody does it. You can find that post HERE if you missed it.

Another popular topic was my ongoing modern sampler quilt, and there’ll be much more about that coming up soon. A few of those blocks are shown below.

This block was made with curves cut freehand

The stats show my readership growing steadily over the 2-1/2 years I’ve been blogging. The growth is slow, but I’m blogging for fun (and I’ve kept my day job!) so that’s just fine. I’ve made some new friends, which is even better.

As always, I’m amazed by the power of the internet. I’ll skip the chance to philosophize about that and just wish anyone who reads this a very happy 2016!

Turns out the Liebster award is a tag game for helping readers discover new and under-read blogs. Wanda over at Wanda’s Life Sampler tagged me. So thanks to Wanda, and I’ll be passing it on to some other bloggers. You can check them out at the end of this post.

Here are my answers to Wanda’s questions, but I changed some of them! The next folks in the chain might change them, too…

1. What one thing do you believe with your whole being?

It’s important to learn something new every day. It may be positive or negative, but all knowledge is useful eventually.

I learned to make a sample block before cutting out the whole quilt!

2. What have you made lately?

I’m glad you asked that question! This month’s finish is the top for a “Black and White and Red All Over” quilt for which I’ve been collecting fabrics for some time.

This was made from a pattern called “Lemon Pepper”, but of course mine is more red pepper!

I also sent 5 donation quilts to the Cincinnati Ronald McDonald House. Three were finished this month, 2 previously. Here are some of them:

Design by Cindy Williams

Simple quilt from a recipe on Craftsy

The “New! Improved!” quilt

3. Are you a cat person or a dog person? Or neither?

Presently neither. Though I do miss having a cat right in the middle of every project and cat hair everywhere 😉

4. Where do you hope to be in 10 years’ time?

Retired from my “day job” and in my quilt studio full time!

5. Favorite dessert?

German Chocolate Cake!!!!

6. What is one thing you wish you were better at?

Always saying the right thing.

7. Describe your Dream Vacation?

The next one! But I did recently have a great trip with my husband to Clingman’s Dome in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

View from Clingman’s Dome

8. Why do you blog?

To promote modern quilting, and North Carolina quilters in particular. If you’re a North Carolina quilter and I haven’t featured your work yet, please contact me!

9. Your best sewing/quilting advice?

Do what you enjoy. I used to make all my own clothes, but then I figured out it’s a lot easier to get a quilt to fit a bed than to get a garment to fit my frame!

10. What else is new?

Here’s a picture of Pat with her FINISHED table runner, started in a class I taught recently!

Pat finished her runner in time to give it as a gift

And here are some bloggers I’m passing the “Liebster Award” on to. I think you might enjoy them!

Sandi’s work was featured in a special display at AQS-Chattanooga, and I was lucky enough to get to interview her. I took some pictures, and if you want to see more of her work, check the links at the bottom of this post.

Sandi designed this nontraditional arrangement of split 9-patch blocks

While I was waiting to interview Sandi, I heard her tell someone, “Any time I make a quilt, I do it to learn something.” My sentiments exactly!

Sandi made this quilt from a pattern, adding modern colors to the design

Sandi started quilting over 25 years ago, using cereal box templates because rotary cutters weren’t yet used for quilting. She still uses templates when appropriate, but a lot of things have changed! For one thing, she now uses freezer paper when she needs templates so she can cut several layers of fabric at once.

Sandi designed and made this quilt using her own quilt-as-you-go technique

Sandi teaches several classes, including her own version of Quilt As You Go. (I’m going to keep an eye on her website because I’d like to take that class if she teaches it anywhere near me 🙂 )

The AQS exhibit included both quilts Sandi designed herself and quilts she has made from designs by others. This was a round robin quilt; Sandi made the final arrangement of sections and did the quilting:

A couple of hints from Sandi: she likes to use the multi-stitch zigzag (stitch #4 on Bernina machines) in her quilting. She starches all her fabrics before cutting to make them smoother and less likely to fray. She says starching also equalizes the weight of the various fabrics. She likes to wash her quilts after they are finished to achieve a crinkly look that emphasizes the quilting.

Sandi does her own quilting on her home machine. This quilt is called “Roy G. Biv”

Sandi also has her own way to successfully select fabrics for a mystery quilt! I’ve only done one mystery quilt and was unhappy with the result, so I asked her about it. She showed the quilt below, designed by Weeks Ringle and Bill Kerr as a mystery quilt, and told me how she selected her fabrics.

Sandi looked at the fabric requirements for the quilt and figured the largest fabric requirement was for the background. Once she had chosen gray for the background, she decided she would need bright fabrics to contrast with it. I think her decisions were very successful!

Zippy Quilts is now two years old! I’m still having fun, so I’m signing up for another two years.
Here are a few pictures of projects from the past two years and links to popular posts:

Rising Star, made for the Quilt Alliance TWENTY contest in 2013

This is “Rising Star”, a quilt I made for the Quilt Alliance “Twenty” contest back in 2013. It’s still one of my favorite quilts, which is why it’s still featured on the blog’s header.

Here is a quilt I made for Modern Quilts Unlimited, where they did especially beautiful photos of it.

Zippy Star Quilt and Pillow as shown in Modern Quilts Unlimited, Summer 2014

Readers seem especially to have enjoyed posts with pictures from various quilt shows, and I know I appreciate those posts when others do them for shows I can’t attend. Here are links to a few of those:

Images for this post are the property of Lee Chappell Monroe, May Chappell and used with permission.

Lee Chappell Monroe

Lee is a North Carolina quilter, designer, and teacher who came to my attention through her blog, which is titled May Chappell. Like a lot of other people, I initially thought May Chappell must be her name. Here’s her explanation of where the name of the blog actually came from:

Why May Chappell? There are always loads of questions about why the company is May Chappell and not Lee Chappell Monroe. You can read all about it here. The short version is that it is named for an awesome lady, my great grandmother.

Lee designs quilt patterns and sells them through quilt shops. She went to quilt market for the first time last year, hoping to give her patterns a wider audience. In addition to quilts, she designs pouches and “loves all things fabric”. Like many modern quilt designers, she is trained as a graphic artist. Here’s one of her quilt patterns:

All Strung Up, a May Chappell design

And here are a few questions Lee was kind enough to answer for me, as well as pictures of more of her patterns:

Here’s a tote bag Lee designed to use mini-charm squares

Q: Where do you think the quilting field is going?

A: This is a toughie. I usually see trends in the questions that I get from my students. I’ve had a lot of students lately that are self taught and they’re interested in learning more about precision. I’m a big believer that there is more than one right way to do things in quilting, but there sure are some wrong ways!

Q: What about your personal quilting future?

A: I have new patterns coming for Spring Market that I’m really excited about. I’m a terrible secret keeper so I usually want to put out the design right as I draw it!

Q: I know you took your patterns to quilt market, but where could I buy them? I don’t see them on your website [Note: They ARE on her website, at least now. Silly me 😉 ]

Eye Candy, one of Lee’s quilt patterns

Lee’s Designer Star Quilt. If you go to her website/shop you can see a picture of the whole thing.

A: I love designing patterns and the printed patterns are available through local quilt shops. Because I also teach quilting at local shops, I’m a huge advocate for supporting local! Quilt shops are a huge resource for the sewing and quilting community. If your shop doesn’t have my patterns, they’re available through the distributors. You can also purchase PDF patterns through my website here. I teach all over North Carolina and I’m starting to expand out across the country. Teaching is my favorite part of my job; I’m passionate about quilting and I love sharing that. You can see my teaching schedule on my website, too.

Q: Show us something pretty you’ve made lately!

A: This is a table runner I made for my brother using my Blue Ridge pattern.

Table runner by Lee Monroe

This post ran longer than usual, but that’s because I just HAD to explain a little about why Lee Monroe has a blog named May Chappell 🙂

For better or worse, I published goals at the beginning of the year, so here’s the review of my progress:
I met all the goals! (Does that mean I didn’t set them high enough?) I retreated with my buddies THREE times instead of just two! I attended 3 big national shows as well as 2 local ones (all were excellent). I took a couple of fun and useful classes, one of which I still need to write up here so you’ll know about it. I submitted several quilts to shows/contests and 3 were accepted. The one I donated to the Quilt Alliance even won something, and sold for $300 to benefit the Quilt Alliance! And I had lots of fun, which was really the point of it all.

Here are pictures of a few of my projects from the second half of the year. The pix of projects from the first half of the year are in this post.

Spring Sun, a design by me, using blocks paper pieced from a totally different Judy Niemeyer pattern! It took about 2 years, but it’s now DONE.

Zippy Star Quilt and Pillow as shown in Modern Quilts Unlimited, Summer 2014

Packet of Posy Seeds, done for the Michael Miller spring challenge

Zippy Star I, which sold at the Asheville Quilt Show in September. This was my “practice piece” for the MQU quilt shown above.

Donation quilt for Ronald McDonald House. I’m going to work more on using up orphan blocks next year.

3. I will limit much more strictly the shows and challenges I enter. It takes too much time and effort that could be spent on making what I want to make 🙂

4. I’ll continue to make donation quilts, including one for the Quilt Alliance. Please consider making one for the Quilt Alliance yourself. You can read about their mission here. Click on “2015 Quilt Contest” to learn about this year’s challenge.

5. I’ll continue my blog, and I think I’ll put up instructions for a few easy donation quilts just in case somebody is looking for ideas.